June 9, 2007

G61: Red Sox 4, Diamondbacks 3 (10)

Micah Owings ... has not pitched since May 29. The last time Owings had 11 days between starts he struggled through his worst outing of the year, giving up seven runs in 2.2 innings May 19 at Pittsburgh.

After that, however, Owings pitched a complete game victory (9-9-1-1-8) against Houston on May 24 and went five innings (5-7-1-2-3) against the Phillies on May 29.

Francona had planned to give Manny Ramirez a day off in Oakland Thursday, but he played, and was expected to play all three games here. ...

Ramirez was hit in the left hand by a pitch from Edgar Gonzalez in the sixth inning, but remained in the game. He was lifted an inning later, after the game had become a blowout. "It's sore," Francona said.

Globe: "Terry Francona said it was not due to Ramirez being hit in the left hand/wrist last night, but Ramirez' unfamiliarity with pitcher Micah Owings and just a good time for a day off. David Ortiz will sit tomorrow against Randy Johnson."

I turned on the sound for a second to see if I could find out what's going on with Lugo and the catcher and got to hear them on the RBI double. I took my earphones out just as they were saying something like "Come on home!" to the scoring runner.

The Lugo discussion -- and it was kind of interesting -- speculated that Lugo asked the ump to check the ball after the catcher pounded it on his left shoulder. Ostensibly to tell Owings he was flying open. They thought Lugo was concerned the catcher was "cutting the ball".

I just want to say, since I'm listening to the D-Backs anouncers, that I really hate the saying "best team in baseball". Honestly, there is no such thing; or, if there is, it's a different team every night. Sure, there's the team with the best record, there's probably the most well rounded team, but I really don't think there's such a thing as A "best team in baseball"

Joe Morgan blabbed his usual blather for nine innings, but it was his "descriptions" of the two teams' playing styles that was the high point of the night for me. Morgan said the Cuban players were "fiery" and "emotional" while the Japanese were "calculating" and "scientific".

Thanks for that "insight", Joe. I'm surprised Morgan didn't call Team Japan "inscrutable" -- though maybe he had already used that adjective for China. (The good people at FJM are way ahead of me.)

And I swear I heard Morgan refer to Japan's manager as "Sodomharu Oh".